1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and a method for controlling a vehicle, and more specifically, controlling driving force driving force and braking force to be applied to the vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional automatic cruise control systems generally control driving force and braking force to be applied to a vehicle such that a vehicle speed is maintained at a target vehicle speed, that is, the vehicle travels at a constant speed (See Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-B-2514461).
As described in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-B-2514461, when the vehicle travels downhill, and thus the vehicle speed exceeds the target speed, the automatic cruise control system tends to executes the driving force control to reduce speed. Thus, when encountering a slope transition from downhill to uphill, the vehicle cannot immediately obtain driving force sufficient for an uphill ascent. It may take some time until the vehicle is ready for uphill driving. Hence, the aforementioned automatic cruise control system has a difficulty in maintaining the vehicle speed at the target speed when the vehicle transitions between traveling downhill to traveling uphill.